Is 22K gold ever strong enough for e-ring/wedding set?

[alirogers20]

My brother in law is a goldsmith and we are talking about completely redoing my wedding set.

He will be taking a diamond band and turning it into an eternity band with 2 pointers and adding 4 diamonds to the existing side stones on my engagement ring to give the illusion that the diamonds go all the way round. I will have another wedding band made down the road exactly like existing wedding band. My set now is in white gold.

We have talked about doing this in platinum or 22K gold with a platinum head for my center stone. I actually prefer the look of gold when it is *just* gold and diamonds (no white metal prongs other than center stone). If I were to redo my set in platinum, I can do each piece one at a time, but I am guessing platinum is still more expensive than 22K gold.

I asked about the softness of the gold being too soft- the setting isn''t chanel set, but is a setting where the diamonds stick above the small prongs, so any contact with the outside of the ring will be contacts on diamond. Does this make any sense? Maybe a bead setting? The inside of the ring will be full gold, with no holes.

I definitely trust him and his work/ideas are stunning. Just curious about the integrity of 22K gold, as I can''t find much online. Thanks!

 

[valeria101]

Another gold lover here....

... would do flush setting and bezels in a heartbeat, prongs? Nope. I have only found three-stone settings with high carat gold prongs, nicely propped by platinum shank and the plat. settings of the sidestones. Solitaires? No. Pave? neither - except for earrings and pendants, not rings and on rather heavy pieces.

As far as I know.

'Thought you might find THIS interesting.


In fact, by 'flush setting' instead of pave I had a certain thing in mind - not unlike band rings there, but more orderly. Hope I can remember where I saw something like this done in yellow gold! These are from Henrich & Denzel.

If in the end using high carat gold demands too much of a compromise from the design part, there's 19kt YG these days.

 

[strmrdr]

There is at least 10 different colors of 18k yellow gold available id stick to those and chose the tone you like.
The most common mix in the US for 18k had a greenish/blue undertone where is Asia deep yellow mix is used.
If I was going to do it id use 18k deep yellow mix.
Iv seen one piece made with it and next to 22k and 24k gold it was actually closer to 24k than the 22k mix was.

 

[alirogers20]

Here is what is the most similar to what he had in the store that he wants to produce, only the entire ring would be gold, save the prongs for my center stone:

http://www.robbinsbros.com/productsearch/productDetail.asp?prod_id=29075&pType=ring&intIsJewelry=0&set_shape=1012

He had it in platinum and it is stunning.

 

[strmrdr]

my 2c 22k gold is too soft for that setting.

 

[FireGoddess]

I think 22kt gold would be too soft for an ering/wband, unless you're a genuine lady of leisure in every respect.

I would stick to 18kt.

ETA: Interesting strm - I didn't know the 18kt came in different yellow color tones.